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Squirrel, was your engi playthrough on veteran? And also, why no glaive? There is perfect melee glaive skill just at lvl 14 (3 if you play synergies).

It's just that I don't want to use ranged attacks and try to play completely melee with this character. I am sure that the glaive can be very powerful but I want to see how far I can get this way.

@karaquazian & DWS: Thanks for the input. As a small update, I am in Act 2 now (still on Veteran) and actually the game has gotten a bit easier now since I picked up some additional skill and stat points as well as new items. I think that my build will only start to take off after level 30 or so when I get access to Shadow Mantle and have some points in Bramble Wall. I'll keep you updated.

That's not the only glaive attack, the first glaive attack is a ranged attack that bounces to up to 4 other enemies and eats everything in it's path.

The glaive sweep is definitely one I'd consider for a melee character as it's a nice way of creating some space, but then, so does burning leap and the back flip, which also have the benefit of getting you out of trouble.

1 its hard going with a 2 hander at low levels, luckily I dropped a nice Orange mace with 4 sockets, so I strapped on a shield and things got easier
2 poison burst passive works better in melee than at range
3 pacts are good obviously
4 but rune vault is even better
5 I've got both pacts bound to the mouse wheel, I lay these down first
6 I've got rune vault (and will have flaming leap) bound to the thumb buttons, after laying the pacts I rune vault out to blind the mobs before going back in and auto attacking, will be even better when can flaming leap back in
7 needs some sort of aoe ability, will be looking at Glaive sweep on the rmb
8 argh dex requirements on outlander gear, its even worse than with the zerker
9 Stats - health, str, speed.

Ah, I had no idea! From seeing the first available glaive skill I assumed that the other glaive skills would also be some kind of ranged attack. Might give this a try. Currently I am using Blade Pact and Repulsion Hex to reduce the enemies' damage output, but I might drop the Hex for standard situations since the knockback is a bit annoying for fighting in melee range.

I gave Bane Breath a try (more or less melee I guess) but decided to refund the skillpoint since killing with the Breath is more trouble than it's worth, at least at lower levels. Since I have to think carefully about how to use my points, I probably won't invest into Bane Breath and Death Ritual, although I like the idea of having a few critters running along.

Soon the Bramble Wall will be available, I'll have to see how well that works (and if I want to use it for my specific build/challenge). On paper it sounds really nice but the same is true for Bane Breath... On the defensive side of things, Rune Vault, Stone Pact, Blade Pact and Shadow Mantle will keep me alive, I hope.

For my further strategy I will likely also have to consider what kind of gear I want to use in the long run. I try to avoid putting points into Focus, since Mana is not a problem at all it seems. The tricky part will be juggling Strength and Vitality in order to get significant damage output while at the same time being able to sustain myself in battle.

Actually missed you last post above, karaquazian. It pretty much mirrors my personal experience with this build, the first levels were a bit painful and I died a couple of times to bosses because I couldn't recuperate fast enough from high damage blows. Especially the Act 1 boss gave me a good whoopin', I had to abuse the town portal mechanism to get him down (planted one right in front of the stairs down to the boss teleporter).

My current weapons are Twostrokes, enchanted with poison and each with two sockets. Might have to replace them soon, but it's good enough for the first maps of Act 2. The Artificer will be a nightmare though.

From my own experience, there doesn't seem to be any situation where having a two-handed weapon is better than dual-wielding.

Some guide I skimmed through mentioned that 2H Hammers have higher DPS than dual 1H weapons, but obviously you would be missing out on on-hit effects. The difficulty level is also a big factor for gear selection I would imagine. Blocking seems to be more important at higher difficulties, at least for classes that don't have a built-in dodge move like the Outsider's Rune Vault.

You can't jump over anything in this game, really, which annoys the crap out of me. The reason why the barbarian was one of my favorite classes in Diablo 2 was the leap attach which let me jump up cliffs (Act 2) or over rivers (Act 3) so when I find myself skirting a wall in Torchlight 2 because my leap won't allow me to jump over this 2 foot ledge I get kinda miffed.

Some guide I skimmed through mentioned that 2H Hammers have higher DPS than dual 1H weapons, but obviously you would be missing out on on-hit effects. The difficulty level is also a big factor for gear selection I would imagine. Blocking seems to be more important at higher difficulties, at least for classes that don't have a built-in dodge move like the Outsider's Rune Vault.

2 handers can work for engis - heavy lifting
And zerker because of their various speed buffs, and if they get in a rage, obviously the crit are bigger. However you then have to build the zerker to get enraged by means other than criting as your weapon is much slower and only 1, so you have to go str / focus and ignore dex so you can spam that axe throw to get your rage meter up. Also you miss that great on execute buff.

I'm not convinced with outlander, I reckon s + b is way to go with melee build, as you get your splash damage from likes of poison burst.

Because its a backwards jump, you need to point the mouse I'm the opposite direction to where you want to jump. This sets up nicely for flaming leap one you get hang of it.

I know how it works. If there's any bit of ground clutter or other geometry behind your character, even if it's not in a straight line behind where you're aiming, it will shorten the leap or make you jump in place which makes it rather weak as an escape/avoidance tool compared to the other classes' mobility skills, especially since you spend a lot of time in confined spaces with lots of clutter around.